Of course, it'd be hilariously difficult to shape a majority against the bonus seats.

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If I'm shown as having been active here recently it's either because I've been using the gallery, because I've been using the search engine looking up something from way back, or because I've been reading the most excellent UK by-elections thread again.

Thank God, if there's anything Greece doesn't need it's to become another Belgium. I wish more countries had this rule. Allowing coalition negotiations for months is not good for anyone.

Finland got some tough coalition negations after last election and rise of the True Finns.

Now the main Finnish newspaper is stating that Greece is going to "election chaos". Maybe we're so interested how does to new government deal with the loans which are a hot debate in the Finnish politics.

Essentially, Greece has some pretty strict time limits for coalition negotiations that could lead to a very intense nine/ten days, and if ND (assuming they're the largest party, o/c) can't manage to form a government in 72 hours, then the parties that have the second and third most seats suddenly become much more important (and there's like six different parties those could be).

Thank God, if there's anything Greece doesn't need it's to become another Belgium. I wish more countries had this rule. Allowing coalition negociations for months is not good for anyone.

Ironically, the Belgian economy seemed to trundle along pretty well during the period when there was no government.

If there were an intrade for Greek elections I would put $5 on the Nazis winning over 15%.

What would happen in that case?

Nothing significant, it's an arbitrary number. But they were surging in the polls before polling stopped and they're exactly the kind of party that would do better on election day than their polling.

If the Golden Dawn manages 15%, it wouldn't be outside the realm of possibility for them to be first place and win the fifty bonus seats. Especially if there's a fairly even split on the left, and the increase in XA support comes mostly at the expense of ND rather than ANEL. Something like this:

With something like that happening, the fifty seat bonus for XA would actually be like half of their seat total. No other party would even think about joining XA in a coalition, though it'd be hard for the other parties to find enough common ground to form a government. You'd probably either see a very loose coalition form that lasts a few months at most, or they'd go through the whole process and end up with new elections- the left would probably make an effort to coalesce around a specific party to take the lead from XA. SYRIZA and DIMAR I'm sure would remerge, at the very least, and as a result get the 50-seat bonus.

Given the high likelihood of an incredibly fractured Parliament, here's the procedure for forming a government in Greece in the absence of a Parliamentary majority:

What if XA, for some improbable reason, became the largest party?

That's about as probable as a member of the communist party being elected President of the US.

Anyway, they've been under constant attack from the entire political spectrum during the last month and I expect them to underperform the last polls.

I don't think they will underperform, but I think they won't get more than 10%.

Despite being attacked from all the parties it didn't stop the other Right-wingers in Europe from overpolling by a few points, because their supporters are still very motivated to go out and vote. So, probably no underperforming (less than 5%).

Given the high likelihood of an incredibly fractured Parliament, here's the procedure for forming a government in Greece in the absence of a Parliamentary majority:

What if XA, for some improbable reason, became the largest party?

That's about as probable as a member of the communist party being elected President of the US.

Anyway, they've been under constant attack from the entire political spectrum during the last month and I expect them to underperform the last polls.

I don't think they will underperform, but I think they won't get more than 10%.

Despite being attacked from all the parties it didn't stop the other Right-wingers in Europe from overpolling by a few points, because their supporters are still very motivated to go out and vote. So, probably no underperforming (less than 5%).

There are plenty other more "respectable" right-wing, anti-immigrant, anti-EU parties to vote for and XA's support is VERY soft. Praising the 1967-74 dictatorship is one thing. But praising Hitler and the Nazis is a big no-no in a country that suffered immensely during WWII and the German occupation.

They only polled at 5%, so in order to become largest party they would need another 15% or so, maybe even 20% because the ND might get easily as much as 25%.

And even if they get 1st (bad for Greece's image, I know), but then there are the more normal partys that can form a government and XA will probably fade into nothingness in the next years.

I was imagining XA-LAOS-?, but I can't find anyone willing to be "?".

I think LAOS is a totally different construction site than XA (but maybe I'm wrong). I always thought of LAOS as a very rightwing FPÖ/BZÖ-like party without the Nazi component. But maybe Lyndon knows more.

Without reading through their Wikipedia article, I would be interested what the XA's position on the German-led austerity measures for Greece is. Do they favor the annexation of Greece to Germany ?

Just because they're Nazi doesn't mean they're pro-German. Their rhetoric towards Germany, the IMF, and the austerity measures is comparable to Hitler's rhetoric towards the Western Allies and the Versailles Treaty.

They only polled at 5%, so in order to become largest party they would need another 15% or so, maybe even 20% because the ND might get easily as much as 25%.

And even if they get 1st (bad for Greece's image, I know), but then there are the more normal partys that can form a government and XA will probably fade into nothingness in the next years.

I was imagining XA-LAOS-?, but I can't find anyone willing to be "?".

I think LAOS is a totally different construction site than XA (but maybe I'm wrong). I always thought of LAOS as a very rightwing FPÖ/BZÖ-like party without the Nazi component. But maybe Lyndon knows more.

There will be no coalition of anybody with XA. Everybody has denounced them as Nazi-loving thugs and pleaded with the voters not to send them in the parliament because that would be an embarrassment for our political system.

Essentially, Greece has some pretty strict time limits for coalition negotiations that could lead to a very intense nine/ten days, and if ND (assuming they're the largest party, o/c) can't manage to form a government in 72 hours, then the parties that have the second and third most seats suddenly become much more important (and there's like six different parties those could be).

Thank God, if there's anything Greece doesn't need it's to become another Belgium. I wish more countries had this rule. Allowing coalition negociations for months is not good for anyone.

Ironically, the Belgian economy seemed to trundle along pretty well during the period when there was no government.

Not really ironic at all. With no government to pass austerity packages, there was nothing to drag the economy into recession.

The Nazi connection is ironic in that it was Italy's foolish invasion of Greece (from their bases in Italian occupied Albania) that sparked the German invasion. Hitler wanted to prepare for the invasion of Russia, and getting involved in a sideshow war in Greece was the last thing he wanted to do, but without Germany's help, the Italians would have suffered a hugely embarassing defeat, and the loss of prestige for Mussolini would have weakened his regime. A further irony was that Greece's leader Metaxas, was considered a somewhat fascist. He died during the war against Italy (before the Germans got in). Germany would have prefered a neutral Greece and wanted peace and quiet in the Balkans while it geared up for its war against Russia.